2015 Cigar of the Year – dmj Edition

I’m not sure how this happened, but this year I only ended up awarding “Perfect 10” scores to 5 cigars. In the past I’ve been fairly generous with my ratings, awarding 10s to as many as 12 or 13 sticks over the course of a year…and when I’m reviewing 150 or so cigars a year, that’s actually a pretty high percentage of cigar perfection (or as close to perfection as you might get).

Maybe I’m getting tougher on the blends and becoming a harsher critic. Maybe there just weren’t that many “OMG GREAT!!!” cigars to hit the market this year. Regardless, I was shocked at the very small number of sticks that made the cut.

The way this works for me is this: I look at all the reviews I published from January to December of this year and pull out anything that is rated a 10/10…doesn’t matter if it’s a regular or LE release…brand new or just new to me (although “brand new” is more likely because we tend to review items as they come out…or as soon as possible). I try to obtain new samples of each one, then smoke them again to see if I still feel the same way and to pit the sticks against each other. Based solely on what’s in my head, I declare a winner of Cigar of the Year. With so few candidates this year, I’m counting down the Top 5 in reverse order of my preference…

#5: Atabey by United Cigar

Atabey definitely falls in the “new to me” category. Before I received it as part of a mailed sampler late last year, I had never heard of the brand, much less tried one. Atabey is the brainchild of Nelson Alfonso, one of those who worked on the branding for the Cohiba Behike. That explains the look of the cigar, which is closer to the Behike design than the L’atelier or PDR AFR-75 even get. But it doesn’t explain the extraordinary flavor brought to the table here.

Atabey is an exquisitely constructed cigar with a refined, complex flavor that has touches of toast, earth, molasses, citrus, coffee and pepper. It impressed me so much I suddenly bought into the $30 price tag, which is just something I find hard to overcome.

Honestly, the memory of this cigar is still sticking in my mind as a singularly great experience and one that I wouldn’t mind repeating…but that’s something I just can’t do anytime soon. The cigars are not only very expensive but very hard to find, so I couldn’t burn a new one for this article. Did that take it out of serious contention for #COTY2015? Not really…even if I could find one to smoke every day, the price tag is just a little hard to justify for anything more than a very special occasion. Everything else on this list is both accessible AND affordable to a wide swath of people.

#4: Fume d’Amour by Illusione

Case in point is this 2014 from Illusione. It actually first appeared at the 2014 IPCPR show, but we didn’t get them to my local shop until early 2015…after they had already been rated the #3 cigar of the year by that big lifestyle magazine. At the time I reviewed Fume d’Amour, I thought they got it wrong…it should have been #1. And for a while it seemed like I would end up with it in my top spot for 2015.

This Nicaraguan puro is made without any Ligero leaf, something of a rarity in the industry and the packaging and banding are an exercise in beautiful simplicity. Flavors of earth, cedar and pepper form the core of the flavors, but there were plenty of floral and nutty notes along the way, as well.

I enjoyed smoking Fume d’Amour several times throughout the year and it was consistently one of the best cigars I could get my hands on…until the last couple that I smoked. Not that they were “bad”…but they just didn’t impress me in the same way as the earlier ones did. Bad batch? Bad sticks in a good batch? Bad day for me? I can’t say. What I can tell you, though, is that this is still one of the best values on the market. It wasn’t quite good enough for #COTY2015, but it was still pretty amazing compared to approximately 200 other blends I tried for the first time in 2015.

#3: J.D. Howard Single Action by Crowned Heads

It’s amazing to see how far Crowned Heads has come in a short amount of time. In December 2011, I called Four Kicks (CH’s first release) my Cigar of the Year. The blend repeated an appearance on the list with the Seleccion No. 5 vitola in 2012 and for the Mule Kick Limited Edition in 2013. Other releases have made other people’s lists from time-to-time as well, and to be honest, there were several from them that came close to being on my list this year…Las Calaveras 2015 was pretty great, a belated look at Angel’s Anvil 2014 was close to perfect, and the 2015 Anvil was very close to contender status. But the one that really got me this year was the Limited Edition based on the J.D. Howard Reserve: Single Action.

Single Action takes the Nicaraguan-based blend by E.P. Carrillo and slims it down to a 38 ring gauge Petite Lancero. The result is a vitola that really shows off the sumptuous Brazilian Arapiraca wrapper leaf to best effect with semi-sweet chocolate and red and black pepper notes leading the flavor charge.

Sadly, a lot of people seem to have missed out on just how good this cigar is. I know we ordered quite a few 10-count boxes at Burns and we still have a lot of them in stock. At this moment, you can get one box (10 cigars) for about 15% off the regular price at Burns…if you buy 2 boxes of 10, you’ll get 25% off. It’s an outstanding deal on an outstanding cigar and I don’t know how long we will be able to offer it, so ORDER NOW.

#2: TAA 2015 by Tatuaje

I work very hard to not get caught up in the hype, the fan-boy-ism, the trend of the moment. So when I heard the pre-release info on the Tat TAA 2015, it didn’t register much with me. Basically it’s this, though…for the 5th consecutive year Pete Johnson releases a TAA exclusive. After going to a different blend in 2013 for the Tat 10th anniversary, for 2014, he went back to the original TAA blend and 2015 replicates the 2011 vitola as well. This is Nicaraguan filler and binder with a Connecticut Broadleaf wrapper. Since I first reviewed this in late September, I’ve smoked through at least 10 or 12 and I do love this cigar…for a while I was convinced this was the winner for #COTY2015.

From the intense aroma of the opening of the wet pack to the beautiful oiliness of the Maduro wrapper leaf, the pre-light experience of the Tat TAA is so good you almost don’t want to light it. But then you do and you get roasted nuts, leather, earth, cocoa powder, coffee, pepper…I finished this one thinking it very well could have been the most complex Tatuaje I had ever had. After smoking half a box, I’m not convinced otherwise.

Realistically, you put the names Pete Johnson and/or My Father on a brand, add Nicaraguan filler/binder and cover with a Connecticut Broadleaf and you’ve got me…I’m in! From the Noellas Reserva to the Jaime Garcia Reserva to the Tennessee Waltz to the La Aroma de Cuba Original Blend, I really enjoy them all. This one is the tops, though…it stands above all the other similar brethren because it just has a great complexity without being over-the-top in strength. I bought a box and I haven’t quite gotten around to opening it yet…still buying single sticks out of the open box, too…I want these to last a long, long time. If not for one late addition to the mix, it would have been the winner. (Burns has 5-packs and boxes of 20 available to buy on their website.)

#1: Sobremesa by Dunbarton Tobacco and Trust

So then there’s that late addition. When I sat down with Steve Saka at this year’s IPCPR to make an order for Burns, he wasn’t able to give me a sample of what we were ordering. So be it…we’ll order based on just his reputation, but we have to order light because predicting how the marketplace will accept a cigar is just damn near impossible. If samples had been ready at the show, I predict he would have sold out the first 6 months of production right then and there.

Saka’s debut solo release, Sobremesa, is a tour de force of complexity. Medium-plus in body, this cigar employs 4 different types of Nicaraguan tobacco, as well as some Pennsylvania Broadleaf in the filler, a Mexican Maduro binder and a Dark Rosado Ecuadorian Habano wrapper leaf. So 7 different varietals spread across 4 different countries of origin. We received 4 of the available vitolas and I’ve had a chance to sample all of them.

I reviewed the Cervantes Fina and it was truly spectacular during the review and on every sample I’ve smoked since. I found the Robusto Larga to be just slightly less amazing and the Corona Gorda to be a couple ticks below that size. The Americano was the only size I’ve had so far that I felt wasn’t quite there…and it could just need a few extra weeks of rest on the shelf in the humidor.

Saka is having the Joya de Nicaragua factory roll this cigar and he is ramping up production in a measured, careful way. I applaud that approach…they may be hard to get for the first few months, but I’d rather have rarity with high quality then ubiquity with a slop job. When production does get up to a better place, though, I really want to buy a box of Cervantas Fina for myself.

With an amazing complexity and flavor that is replicated in almost every available vitola, it’s no wonder the Sobremesa is my #COTY2015.